Let’s Talk About Skills, Baby

The Skill: Blending your various interests into one niche perspective. 

This week, we’re diving into Season 1 Episode 2 of Let’s Talk About Skills Baby. In this episode host, Kelly Ryan Bailey speaks with Tony Tsai, Director of Leadership Development at University of Utah’s School of Medicine about the changes to higher education that he feels would most benefit students. Tony believes that while every student chooses a degree to pursue, they are still responsible for their own skillset. It is not enough to just take the classes offered in your program, you really have to take command of your own education, pursue things that interest you, and get a well-rounded exposure to different areas of study. 

Key Takeaway: Higher Education no longer draws a straight line to employment, rather it is a training ground for life’s more durable skills – like how to think critically, manage time, and navigate competing perspectives and deadlines.  

Learn more at skillsbaby.com/gotskills

The Skill: Staying Curious 

This week, we’re diving into Season 2 Episode 15 of Let’s Talk About Skills Baby. In this episode host, Kelly Ryan Bailey speaks with Jay Latta, CEO at Stint about the importance of staying curious and creative when it comes to both our professional and personal lives. He is interested in learning what happens when we stop looking at humans as resources and start looking at them as assets, whose constant curiosity fuels our collective development.  

Jay believes our main human need is to stay curious, and that eliminating competition is the key to moving past a scarcity mindset.  

Key Takeaway: Your Skills Story is way more than the tasks you were asked to complete on a job. It explains how your curiosities have manifested into specific skills that will help you continue learning and growing throughout your life. 

Learn more at skillsbaby.com/gotskills  

Got Skills is produced by Growth Network Podcasts 

Subscribe to Got Skills for more episodes!

The Skill: Human skills, that cannot be easily replicated or taught. The ones that continue to make us relevant as technology improves and machines take over many jobs. 

This week, we’re diving into Season 2 Episode 14 of Let’s Talk About Skills Baby. In this episode host, Kelly Ryan Bailey speaks with Leonor Stjepic, CEO of Montessori Group about what she calls essential life skills or human skills. Just so we’re clear, these skills Leonor is referring to are often labeled “soft skills,” however, she is very passionate about changing that vernacular.  

In her experience hiring, she says she has never picked a candidate because of their hard skills or credentials, she picks them for who they are. 

Key Takeaway: A technical skill might help you get a job, but a human skill helps you keep the job, and ultimately grow in the job. 

Learn more at skillsbaby.com/gotskills

Got Skills is produced by Growth Network Podcasts

Subscribe to Got Skills? for more episodes!

The Skill: Caretaking is a professional skill. Period.  

This week we’re diving into Season 2 Episode 9 of Let’s Talk About Skills Baby. In this episode host, Kelly Ryan Bailey speaks with Riccarda Zezza, CEO of Lifeed. Lifeed is the only learning platform in the world that transforms life transitions and care activities such as parenting, caring for an elderly person, or going through a crisis, into opportunities to train workplace skills.   

Riccarda explains some of the skills that stand out as key learnings from parenthood, and how they directly build essential professional skills. Now, if you’re scratching your head trying to figure out how cleaning spit up or taming a temper tantrum has prepared you for your next job, tune in to learn how!  

Key Takeaway: The more you can see your time spent caretaking as an asset, not a distraction, the more you can tell the complete story of your skills, and more importantly of who you are. 

Learn more at skillsbaby.com/gotskills  

Got Skills is produced by Growth Network Podcasts 

Subscribe to Got Skills on your favorite podcast app for more episodes!

The Skill: Framing Your Life Skills As Professional Skills 

This week, we’re diving into Season 2 Episode 5 of Let’s Talk About Skills Baby. In this episode host, Kelly Ryan Bailey interviewed Omer Molad, who is the co-founder and CEO of Vervoe, a computer software company that helps organizations make great hiring decisions based on how well candidates can do a job, rather than how good they look on paper. 

Omer discusses why being a generalist rather than a specialist, can be more helpful in the long run of your career, and how you can showcase your life skills as professional skills.  

Key Takeaway: Your past performance isn’t necessarily a predictor of your future success. It’s the collection of skills you’ve honed over time and how you apply them to a new role that determines your success. 

Learn more at skillsbaby.com/gotskills  

Got Skills is produced by Growth Network Podcasts 

Subscribe to Got Skills wherever you get your podcasts to continue listening!

The Skill: Talking about your skills with a hiring manager 

This week, we’re diving into Season 2 Episode 4 of Let’s Talk About Skills Baby. On this episode, host Kelly Ryan Bailey interviewed Cynthia Hansen who is the head of the Adecco Group Foundation. Being able to frame the skills you have from past experiences to someone who has not worked with you before or is not familiar with your industry, is really important.  

In order to craft the story of your skills, you have to take a critical look at all of the collective personal and professional experiences you’ve had and identify what skills and behaviors you used in each. That way, you can consider and highlight what skills best demonstrate your potential for success in the specific opportunity you are after, and arrange them in an easy-to-follow narrative order. 

Key Takeaway: Sharing your skills story doesn’t only occur in job interviews. The ability to talk about your skills also helps you write a much more effective resume and cover letter! 

Learn more at skillsbaby.com/gotskills  

Got Skills is produced by Growth Network Podcasts   

Subscribe to Got Skills wherever you get your podcasts to continue listening!

Introducing our newest podcast from the Skills Baby Team!

Skills talk is hard. Talking about what you do why you’re good at it is a challenge for most people at all stages of their careers. Introducing, “Got Skills,” a podcast where we explore how to understand the skills you’ve got and talk about them with other people. We’ll help you breeze through the next family reunion, interview, or mentorship opportunity by better understanding your skills and how to talk about them!   

Learn more at skillsbaby.com/gotskills 

Got Skills is produced by Growth Network Podcasts  

Season two of Let's Talk About Skills, Baby featured guests from all around the world who are all making an impact on the future of skills. On this special bonus episode, Kelly is joined by Producer Sari Weinerman to discuss the reoccurring themes throughout the season and share some exciting announcements.  

The most prominent themes across the 19 interviews we did this season were social-emotional learning, transferable skills across industries, re-imagining education systems, and achieving equity through skills-based hiring. Get a glimpse at what we learned about these themes, and hear about our new show Got Skills! 

Takeaways:  

• (6:00) “Learning happens all the time in every interaction that you have. I feel like this moment, not only will teach parents, that learning is happening all the time, but that we can start checking in with students' emotions.” 
• (12:00) “Skills are something that you don't just pick up one time and you know, it forever. I tend to use the analogy of either parenting or playing sports, I didn't just pick up a basketball and become amazing at basketball that day, I worked at it every day for years. And as a parent, you're working at those skills every day, all the time at home and at work.” 
• (18:00) “For a person applying to a job right now, remember that the systems are set up to read basic skill information from your CV or resume, and on there are your basics, it's your education, it's the last jobs you held...Is that really a true picture of what you're capable of? No is the answer it's not a good picture, and that's such a shame.” 

Skillsbaby.com/gotskills 

For a long time now, skills assessments have been fairly unreliable. Asking a candidate for a review of their skills will only provide one-sided feedback. Trusting anonymous credentials is also not providing a clear enough picture. That is where Skill Survey comes in. They are working to create a system where peer feedback will help tell the skills stories we need to hear for most effective hiring.  

Hear from Randy Bitting, Co-Founder of the Career Readiness Project, and Jake Burke, VP of Sales at Skill Survey, about how changing the way we collect and report on skills data will help all involved.  

Big Takeaways:  

• (9:15) The gap between who a student thinks they are and how they present themselves to the world can be very large. It's the role of the career services or student employment supervisor to point out that gap so the student can take it with them on their journey to their first full-time job. 
• (12:33) The big shift is from hard skills to soft skills; hard skills are typically what you're hired for, and soft skills (or behavioral competencies) are either the reason you're let go or the reason you grow in a certain position. 
• (23:28) Punctuality and attendance are in the top 10 areas that students and job candidates need to improve nationwide, and they are a huge predictor of future success. 

Skillsurvey.com/career-readiness 

Let’s talk about finding your passion. Sometimes it is less than obvious, but it is always a journey! Kelly is joined by Fumbi Chima, CIO and Executive Vice President at BECU to discuss her career journey, and the skills she honed along the way. One of the most important skills being curiosity. Staying curious and constantly innovating was the key to Fumbi’s amazing success!  

Fumbi believes you have to ask for help and not be afraid of doing so.  

Big Takeaways:  

• (8:29) It's not being scared to say 'here's what I want to do--here's my aspiration.' It's the admission of 'yes, this is what I want and this is who I want to be' that is so important.
• (11:06) "I ascribe innovation to natural curiosity. Whether it's process, functionality, or people; how do you refine it? I'm constantly curious, trying to make things just a little bit better than they were before." 
• (15:35) I would say 'no' is not an option. 'I cannot' is not an option either, because you've got to explore everything. Ask for help. Tell people what your aspirations are so they can find ways to help you. 

BECU.org

Skillsbaby.com